Welcome to the 27th installment of the League of Extraordinary Riveters Terrain Competition!
This is a terrain building competition, hopefully that's self-evident from the title...
The League's aim is to encourage our fellow gamers and model-makers to up their game while building terrain for their tabletop, be it for wargames, board games or dioramas. We encourage participants to use this thread to trade ideas, inspiration, encouragement and feedback.
Everyone is a winner in a League competition. Because, in the end, your entry is also your prize.
The first place winner, however, will win another great prize. They will be named a member of the League of Extraordinary Riveters, a group of dedicated artists and modelers who put great effort into having their work be extremely detailed (like being willing to glue on thousands of rivets).
The first place winner will also pick the theme for the next round, and become judge for that round.
Each round has a “theme” or other defining attribute(s) that must in some way be applied to the your terrain project, to compete with other modellers.
The competition is open to everyone registered on Dakka Dakka, all are welcome to enter regardless of skill, experience, ability, age or any other attribute someone might use to divide hobbyists up The winner of each round hosts the next round, and the cycle continues.
The theme, limitations, rules, judging and prizes are all the responsibility of the host, although he or she can get help from others for some of those things...
For those who are returning once again to compete a most sincere and heartfelt welcome back! And to anyone competing for the first time, awesome! And welcome!
If you haven't taken part before, check out the previous rounds below. These are full of interesting, intriguing, entertaining and just downright awesome builds and ideas, a great source of inspiration. The judge for each round was , as should be clear from above, the winner of the previous round, with the exception of the first, set by one of the League's founders dsteinglass.
My challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to create your terrain piece utilising packaging from a favourite sweet. Sweet here to be taken as meaning confectionery, desserts, sweet treats etc.
Cookie packets, yoghurt pots, Smarties tubes, Tic-Tac boxes, ice-cream cartons, Pez dispensers, fruit salad cans, cake moulds, boiled sweet wrappers, all these and more are crying out to have tiny toy soldiers clambering over them on a daily basis.
Heed the cry, liberate the sweet, sweet packaging from the clutches of the confectionery vendor overlords....
I would like every participant to post their idea/ideas on this thread. I like to see ideas being bandied about just as much as I enjoy seeing WIP.
All scales and all game systems are welcome. The size of your piece doesn't matter and big vs small will be judged equally. The League wants you to push yourself to the next level in artistic ability and creativity, not size.
One very important thing to do, is post lots of "work in progress" pictures on this thread. This will let everyone enjoy the process of what you are creating. The members of LoER, participants in these contests, and the Dakka community as a whole love to help each other and give advice. A huge part of these competitions are to help you improve as an artist. Let people enjoy your WIPs and give suggestions to make it even more amazing. Constant updates from all of us will also keep this contest easier to find, which will allow more people to come and enjoy everyone's work, and get more people excited about joining in. (If more people join, you'll be even more proud if you win against 20 competitors rather than 2).
Do not post your finished work on this thread They should be PMed to me for judging, but you can still feel free post your finished work on your own P&M blog if you have one (just not here).
Try to take good pictures, if no one can see how good your piece is, how will we know? After all the work you put into your piece, don't slack on the pictures. Use this as a good excuse to improve your picture taking - if in doubt, ask for help, there's guides and articles here on dakka, in the wider wargaming community, and people here are generally willing to give advice - if we help others take better pictures, we can better see what they're producing in their work Lighting, focus, and cropping - 3 things to think on.
Guidelnes:
1. Talk about the competition. Make as many people know as you can. If you have a P&M blog, it's great to mention it there. I think it's a good idea to post you WIPs in your P&M blog as well as here, it gets your post count up faster, and will encourage the visitors of your blog to check out this competition. The more the merrier, and the flow of ideas, critiques and general banter increases exponentially as the number of entrants increases.
One of the best things you can do, is put the League terrain competition banner in your signature:
HTML code for the banner:
{url=https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/763930.page#10154516]{img]http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery/2012/11/8/429237_md-.jpg{/img]{/url]
change all the "{" to "["
It should look and work like this one:
2. The deadline for this competition will be to have your stuff in by the end of 29th December 2018. 3 whole months, plus some spare change. It seems a long time, but let's face it, life tends to get filled up pretty quickly for many people around December time I say the 29th as that means I can hopefully have judged and make an announcement to start the New Year in If life happens hard for a few and extensions are requested, it's likely to happen.
Spoiler:
Midnight Saturday 29th December GMT
Amsterdam - Sunday 30th, 01:00
Buenos Aires - Saturday 29th, 21:00
Chicago - Saturday 29th, 18:00
Darwin - Sunday 30th, 10:00
Hong Kong - Sunday 30th, 08:00
LA - Saturday 29th, 16:00
To be fair, it's honestly more likely that it will be anything that comes in before I wake up and log in is accepted
3. Scratch-builds, heavy conversions and their like are the order of the day - hopefully obvious from this round's theme Innovative use of bits always gets my attention.
4. Your model should be a piece of terrain, or a diorama that includes a piece of terrain, suitable for gaming. It should not be a playable model in itself (a crashed tank must stay crashed), but removable models (people) are fine.
5. Any scale, any setting, any game system or board game is welcome. Likewise, it could be for a non-existent game, just so long as rule 4 is accounted for. Also any size for the actual piece you're making is great as long as you can photograph it clearly.
6. Final Entry: Six or more photos of your final entry, showing top, front, both sides, back and all the important parts - not to be posted in this thread. PM me with links to your galleries, albums, P&M blogs, or just the straight up pictures, etc. As said above, please take the time to take the best photos that you can. I would also like to know what part(s) are used for the theme - where and what is the packaging? A sentence or two on what your piece represents should be included.
ie.
Spoiler:
Biscuit packaging used to create the main building shape.
Sub-surface generator station, with walkway.
7. AMBITION: Push yourself. Try something new! Always wanted to use LEDs? Go for it! Fancied weathering powders? Here's your chance! I'll be looking at your galleries for previous work, entries etc. I want everyone to feel that their best has a fair shot at this. The spirit of these competitions has always been about learning, expanding, discovering.
8. Not so much a rule, but it wouldn't be the League of Extraordinary Riveters if there are no rivets. This also means similar small details are highly valued (rivets are the best example of this level of detailing).
9. THE RULE OF COOL trumps all.
Overview I will be judging based mainly on creativity, artistic ability compared to your other works, following the theme, if your piece embodies the detail that the league is known for, and most of all if I think it's cool. No points system, no set criteria to mark against, just a purely subjective opinion from me This may mean it's not necessarily the BEST model that wins....that's just the way I'm rolling this round
The Prize Membership to the League of Extraordinary Riveters as top prize. You will be allowed to fly the League's banner and be recognized as a modeller devoted to impressive detail (or Rivets).
The warm fuzzy feelings inside and the bragging rights that your peers love and are impressed with your work. And as is league tradition, I will also mail you a small modelling/war game based prize as well, in my case that's likely to be a bits bag of some sort, purely because if I offered to make you something you would likely not receive it till we are looking at Round 1459 as I would take approximately 16 years to finish.....
I think that's everything, but don't hesitate to ask for clarification, post here, and most importantly..have fun!
Ahaha did not see that one coming, great choice ! Not sure what I'll build, but I am definitely in... Maaaaybe I'll wait a bit until the halloween sweets are in, might be an opportunity to get some intersting packaging...
Ooooor, I can put jelly on a plank and leave it in my basement. Should get a nurgle demonworld terrain by december.
soooo....i need to ask the definition question...theme says "sweet as chocolate"... does it mean sweet is compellingly? or is such a thing as a chips packaging still a viable material? if so...then below you will see a starter list of materials i plan to use...
an assortment of chips can (something like pringels...)
a wine bottle rack easy to build system i got from a DIY store...
and some cardboard rings you get at IKEA for free (their jugs and plates stuff gets stored that way...)
more stuff will soon follow also the height of everything is not written in stone yet...might be half a meter high or just around 30 cm...we´ll see^^
I think it's pushing it to include chip packets, but as my initial idea was "totally tubular" (cleatus used similar in his round, hence I switched ideas) I think I'll give you a pass.........with a condition *cackles evilly*
One bit/part/piece, no matter how small and insignificant, from something that is definitely sugary, and I'll assume that chips are sweets.
Actually, to be fair, I didn't specifically state that the majority of the piece needed to be crafted from sweet packaging.......
(Alternatively, tell me you eat chips as dessert....)
thanks cleatus! but as you will soon see, i´ve changed the plan... probably one day the chips rolls day will come...
but for now i went true to the theme and got me sweets packaging...in hex shape!
the chocolate chips are already all gone
then with my handy hot wire cutter table i made the surfaces...the foam board i use comes with a detailed surface...at first i hated that... now i see billions of uses^^...
process of building towers for `munda...
two towers for my entry... i will add later on some straps and then some mad amount of rivets of course...
Excellent looking miradors Viktor Von Domm, great choice of texture.
Went on a salvage mission last week and picked a box of caramels. In order to make the box look bigger and fancier to buyers, manufacturers added a large piece of soft plastic inside, and in our case, it is very good news. After doing some cutting I ended up with the base for two nice looking arches :
Can't say I have a plan yet, need more components, but I think I'll be building some kind of chaos dais...
Llama - Tough call, but I think I have to say most shots aren't sweet and so Smarties do have the answer in this case. Unless you only use the shot glasses for vodka jellies of course.....
And that's fine. As I said to Vik, I didn't actually specify that the 'sweet stuff' needed to be the main component. Now I may consider how much is sweet when I come to judging, but as long as there's something in there it's a valid entry.
Coh - And I want to see that Ice-Kreem truck .......
I did mention that I would include the definition of 'sweet' as a dessert, so could involve fruit, yoghurt, rice pudding, and potentially cheese and biscuits.....
Maniac - That would be the antithesis of the brief I hate to say no, especially when telling someone what to use when building, but when I consider my answers to Vik and Llama, I think I have to say no - although as I have mentioned previously, I made no stipulation on whether the sweet bit has to be the main part - so utilising both sweet and anti-sweet may be a road well worth exploring
Damn, I'm starting to feel like a bad guy with my clarifications now
Just seen this thread so I suppose I'll enter my work from today.
Just so happens that I was making some Shadespire terrain out of some wedding cake pillars, plastic pirate coins, 10p coins, milliput, statues from the old GW chapel kit and tiddlywinks. Seems sweet enough.
Here's some pics! Enjoy. ...
Edit: And they're fething sideways. I'll fix later. It's been a long day.
OK here we go then...
So first lets choose a base to work from....only really putting this up to show I have lots of mdf laminate floor cut up to make terrain bases, highly recommend picking up a few bits, even a end of line box at the local DIY store and spend a few minutes cutting it up.
Some sweety wrappers.....
Bit of foamcore...
Want a few details so lets make some...
And after adding a layer of styrene sheet we start to add the details...
Well, I'm in for some 15mm scatter terrain. I have a couple different dental floss containers I want to build a power generator out of, plus some for some crashed escape pods.
I'll find something 'sweet' that I can use with them. Maybe some coffee stiring straws (used to stir in sugar) or some wrappers to make some crashed bilboard signs to go with the pods.
Oooh, or maybe the lid to one of the plastic gum tubs to act as a silo to go with...
KernelTerror wrote: @Viktor von Domm: Haha, I would have sworn it was also a word in english, my bad ^^.
all is good...my son has reached the seventh grade, and is starting french lessons...so a little nudge here and there helps me help him
It is a word in English, at least as an architectural term. I think we borrowed if from Spanish. The verb is Mirar. Interesting aside, the word Admiral is from the same root.
My dentist would be most displeased if he saw me viewing this thread Nice work so far everyone.
Excellent to see all these projects getting started, very promising.
Today I added a second box of sweet to my entry, delimiting the roof of the building :
Nice work folks, and like Monkeytroll said lots of variety.
I am really thinking about mine, the "sweety wrapperr" is so obscured I feel I am cheating, going to have to work harder on some extra bits with sweets in mind.
While hunting this weekend I was inspired to try something I've always considered, but haven't tried, a billboard from an existing item. I was eating a Cliff Bar on the stand, and thought to myself it would make a great billboard for this project. It's sugary (coconut and chocolate), with a great image that could be used for multiple scales. Thus here is the start of that:
Then I've also made some progress on the crashed escape pod. I've used some push pins, part of a russian hind model kit, and a repurposed plasticard square to make a hatch, and various fidly bits.
Lastly, as one of the items to use is sprue, I've made my first foray into plant life from sprue to add some small ferns to my planter box:
What are you making me buy monkeytroll... These liquid candies probably contained all the chemicals on the planet ^^. Well after flushing their content down the drain, they provided me with column for my build :
It's rather uninspired (and hopefully not considered unfair that it is only cardboard) but what is your view on me joining the contest using this nerds box as the main building material (along with lots of hot glue and probably a little sculpting). I'm planning to try to make a cistern/fountain type piece of terrain for D&D
Sounds great. Random sweetie boxes work well I seem to be making some kind of Joker funland out of various sweetie boxes. I'm not sure how that sits within the rules? But in the meantime, building number 2 (from a Retro sweetie box) is almost done:
url=https://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/977146-Dmh%201.html][/url]
Thanks for the encouragement Vik, Graven, and monkeytroll. And Graven, those joker buildings are looking really cool. I really like the design.
I've gotten started on the cistern, but not very far yet. It's going to measure a little over 2 inches by 3 three inches. I've cut up the nerds box and started laying out the measurements.
I've started sculpting a hawk head statue that will be spitting out water into the pool. This cistern in in the basement of Tresendar Manor (Lost Mines of Phandelver). The only information on the Tresendar family was that one of the family members was known as the "Black hawk". I decided that the a hawk could be the family crest (as apposed to a helicopter)
little late on the posting, but I'm going to give this a shot. Honestly don't have any good sweets containers lying around, (most of my favorites are in wrappers), so I thought I'd bend the rules a bit (please don't kill me). Instead of my favorite treat, I give you the cat's favorite treat.
Behold the Kitty Treat RefineryTM!
I have made more progress than this, so I will upload additional WIP pics at some point soon.
Hmm I just picked up an interesting shaped container of Tic Tacs the other day thinking it could make some good terrain, consider me entered!
I have always wanted to have a go at some Infinity style terrain with a more clean aesthetic so this will be a good chance for me to experiment a little bit
OK little silly bits.
Oil drums from a straw and some glue stick...
Man hole cover/ ground entrance, from a smarties lid.
Shiny foil antenna dish from sweety wrappers.
Much swearing and glue was harmed in the making of this lot.
the smarties lid...i never could gather enough currage to pull that one off...for fear of not pulling it off good enough...well now i know what it might have looked like...
also...proof of that i am still working on things...
also...sweet () reminder that this is in fact a Leage of extraordinary RIVETEER terrain competition...thus...Rivets...:
note...all the still white rivets will be sealed soon enough...but since i currently apply rivets with a small syringe and white glue...(it´s probably the speediest way ever...) they´re still shiny and white^^
Exactly! Not my idea, but with patience and a steady hand it will let you apply hundreds of rivtes with just a fraction of the time other methods would take... One tiny droplet of pva equals yon new and shiny rivet...and it next to everything sticks ob any surface...
I would go beige bud. Looking fantastic. And a creamy colour will allow some nice weathering streaks, Also make it viable for most game systems, avoid going all grimdark and you can still use it for other games systems.
A very tiny bit of progress on sculpting the hawk head, I can only sculpt a few feathers at a time without messing others up. (but hey, it'll help keep this thread near the front of the forums for people to notice)
I enjoyed making the first ship so much, I decided to try my hand at a second. Thus a merc ship, inspired by a Starwars ship, namely Bossk's ship (Hounds Tooth) and this excellent ship idea blog (https://www.reddit.com/r/penships/), made from a tape measure using the packaging from the pens (whose caps serve as the engines), coffee stirers, and some brass rod and plasticard channel. Oh, and a tau gun drone from my bits box.
Yes, that is the danger of this hobby isn't it. Try this then if you want some great modern takes on the old deodarant tank. Really awesome ship/tank/walker conversions:
I've poached a few and have a 15mm shampoo bottle transport conversion sitting on a shelf while I decide on how I want to paint it.
Anyone have good ideas for making 15mm sized cargo crates (sci-fi) or other items you might find on a launch pad similar to below:
Spoiler:
Round tubes and square/rectangle are easy, but some of the hexagon/octogon shapes are a little more exotic. Maybe cut up some bic pens? I worry they would be difficult to cut well/correctly.
@Maniac_nmt: That merc ship looks really cool, I'm glad you decided to make more ships. And wow that deodorant tank you linked to looks freakishly good
Yeah everything in this thread looks incredible, some serious modelling talent being shown off here!
I was in the dollar store today and spotted this beauty, after pouring out the weird sugar capsules I was left with a great start for some terrain. I am now thinking it will be a post apocalyptic ice cream bar (cause the challenge involves sweet stuff, geddit? )
I also had some glow in the dark paint for my other project so that will be making an appearance here as well hopefully...
And yes, Magnus the Red is hiding in the background asking why I have neglected him for an ice cream cone. I have way too much stuff on the hobby to-do list!
Oh, you know, just slaving away in the SWEETEST shipyard in the galaxy.
Main thruster exhaust bells:
General shape comes together:
NOW we're going somewhere:
Classic 'beauty shot', three-quarters view:
Still not quite sure what 'scale' this beast will be, but it's been a fun ride so far.
Also, the ship's captain is NOT named "Roj", because this contest isn't about re-purposing a microphone.
For the record, there are currently THREE non-sweet-related polygons in there, a laundry detergent cap, some wire nuts, and a spraypaint can cap. Everything else is from sweets, candies, juices, frosting containers, etc.
Settin' the bar. Although, I must admit, the wafer-towers are pretty damn cool.
Still plugging along on the hawk head, sculpted three more feathers today. it's frustrating that I can only do a few at a time without messing up what I have already made. I'm almost done with all the feathers.
Got a late start, but a start nonetheless. Forgive the awful pic from my kindle.
I can't decide how to handle the window. I could pry the lid off and do an inside, which is probably what I *should* do but I'm thinking of putting a screen over it instead to keep the 'nids out, or a window with a big "Closed" sign in it.
I'd love to find a little ice-cream-cone the right size to be above it, but failing that I'm thinking a piggly-wiggly style sign where both sides say "Scream!" on the bottom half, with a rotating circle that says "I" on one side, and "U" on the other.
I have some light sanding to do, but here's the converted bubble gum container plus, ironically, the cover for a sonic tooth brush head.
I did find some suitable beads at Michael's which were on sale plus some nifty bits for wiring to make a console for the landing pad. Which enabled four pads for 4 ships, of which I will probably only get three done for the contest.
In keeping with the spirit, I will try something new for weathering. I've seen the salt method, using water and chunks of salt which you paint over. I think I am going to try it with sugar instead of salt and see what I get.
"...and that's when I realized the contest was to make TERRAIN."
Oops.
So, uh, hi!
Here's a diorama of a pair of Wayforger-Clan Triceptors escorting one of the clan's Liberty-class Corvettes. In this game of "Check Six!", the action focuses on individual strikefighters dogfighting amoungst the stars. Our studio craftsfolk have created this Clan Corvette as a themed piece of terrain to battle over and around.
Yeah, THAT'S the ticket...
Still mostly sweets containers, but I figured for the "game pieces" it would be okay to pull in some other polygons.
Turrets on the Liberty-class Corvette are from bitz and bobs, representing a necessary increase in non-sweets-container-polygons, in order to bring LoER-level details to the ship.
Enjoy my madness.
--B.
PS: Play 'spot the sweets container bitz from this earlier picture!
I'm sure it could count as terrain in something like BFG or the like - and although I was a bit hard on some rulings in the early stages, this gets a pass just for Liberator reasons....
Wow I have a lot of catching up to do, some awesome stuff being created here!
I started working on the ice cream shack finally. I found a pile of offcuts from laser printed terrain that worked really well. The goal is to go for a Fallout 4 style ice cream shack on a pier, lots of work to go though.
I still have to turn the container into an actual building but the basic layout seems very promising
monkeytroll wrote: I'm sure it could count as terrain in something like BFG or the like - and although I was a bit hard on some rulings in the early stages, this gets a pass just for Liberator reasons....
@monkeytroll, yeah they are really come in handy, never thought to use them till now!
Looking more like an actual building now, I used an empty container of cake sprinkles as a base. I still have to add a paper mache top to it but the whole thing is really taking shape. I decided I am going to have a monster chained to the pier, maybe being kept as a pet by the resident of the little hut.
I also changed the orientation of the piece as this way I can fit more on the base. At this rate I should be done in plenty of time!
@Briancj: Brian, I'm very glad you were mistaken and built ships instead of more traditional terrain, because those are just great!
@Commander Cain: Ice cream shack is looking good, and I don't remember an as up to date pic on your blog, so this is a treat
My gloss varnish arrived today, so I'll try to get back to work on my entry at the end of the week.
Thanks folks, not the biggest update in the world but it's nice to keep this thread alive! I added some corrugated metal to the top of the shack and there is now a little monster in the water. Nearly ready for paint I think...
Before you call it finished, I'd suggest a light grey wash, just to help the details 'pop' and give that little bit of 'driving through space dust' look.
Apologies for the dreadful lighting, but this will at least show that my entry ain't dead ^^ !
Added some more plastic bits to the temple today, many half egg shaped transparent bits to the top, that will make nice niches, part of an Audi for the roof, and some screw wrapping for an additional column with more niches inside. Also started gluing together some cables, that will come toughen up the pillars.
Thats nice work, and really like the car part, got a nice industrial finish to it that will actually suit the roof of such a building well. All the nonsense hidden up top.
Loving the size differences in the various projects.
28 Days Later..........is the finish line. So plenty of time still if we're talking technically - realistically that's not all available time at this time of year I know
Looking good everyone! Sorry that I haven't posted any progress in so long, I've been distracted by many other projects. I've finally started painting my piece, but it's still long way to go.
@Maniac : indeed, it made is easier to imagine how each texture will look once painted, and where additional detailing was needed. Which started this evening :
I finally got around to painting today. These will be the last two pictures I post on this thread because of how close to finished I am. This was my first time trying to paint something to look like marble. Certainly not great, but I am really surprised how well it came out. I cut off a tiny sliver of kitchen sponge, and finished off by making some thin streaks off of them which i them watered down and lessened with my brush (based off of a technique Cam described for making a marble pattern).
I just sent monkeytroll a PM with my finished piece pictures. Good luck everyone. This has been a fun contest where I tried new things just like LoER was meant to do. My first time painting something to look like marble and also my first time painting verdigris. (first time painting verdigris probably shows that I'm not great about painting my stuff )
Probably the last WIP upload, added around a hundred faces on the main arches, base paints and washes applied, only some details and highlight to do and that will be it :
For me its not 40k related...it has more a very strong giger- esque vibe going on...which i think is a billion times harder to achieve... My hat is off to you!
Thanks Syro_ ! But not that much no, they are made from molds of actual models, sometimes slightly reworked. Cleaning up once dry and gluing into place was a bit tedious, but doable.
Now that's a thought Viktor, If I ever need to rivet armor on a titan size demon engine, I shall do it using faces....Aaaaand I just realized that for the second time in two entries, I submitted something without a single rivet to the LOER competition... Way to troll me tzeentch, way to troll me...
Commander Cain wrote: A whole week, loads of time! I simply have to paint everything and learn how to create realistic looking water effects for the first time...
They are molded from a daemonette face, but yeah, still have to clean after it, and took most of yesterday's evening !
Automatically Appended Next Post: And final entry submitted ! Good luck to all of you who are still working on their entries, can't wait to see the final list of entries !
I for one am done...so how do you want your entry relevant images to be given? I've already created a gallery with the finished pics...and in another gallery there are still WIP pics... I could put them in one gallery for your ease of use if you want...
Final update before I finish everything off I hope! Just waiting on the waves to solidify before I can do anything else but it is coming along nicely. Hopefully I can be all done with a day to spare
All good stuff guys! Still a bit over two days to go.
Off the top of my head I've had finished entries now from Brian, Vik, Syro, Maniac, Kernel.....pretty sure Cam and graven have at least something finished, and Cain is about to. Take none of that as gospel though
Yeah - poor show on the judge's part, someone should have a word with them......
It may be that the 1st isn't quite feasible.... I also did not post a public poll - this was not deliberate, just ended up doing more than I thought over the intervening days. I will post a line-up and get a public poll up tonight. And will announce winners on....Sunday.
Apologies for the delay (because it's not purely down to the hard judging this round)
In the grand tradition of awards ceremonies, I thought I’d kick off with a look back at all the entries….
BrianCJ:
Sweet Liberty
Brian built a large corvette to act as a terrain piece in a BFG style game.
Turret details and parts of the smaller ships from his bits box, almost everything else is made from a variety of sweet stuff packaging.
Brian also included this lovely bit of text detailing the context of the piece:
-----------------------------------------------------
Back in the late 80's, a company called Starforge Strategic Games, Inc (SSGI) created their starfighter miniatures game known as "Check Six!". Like most attempts back then, things were quite crude. Most things were cast in lead/pewter, and were necessarily small. SSGI thought they would try their hand at resin-casting, instead, to make a splash with 'larger' miniatures. But a niche market is still a niche market, and back then 'quantity' was preferred over quality. Why buy ONE (large) mini when you could get five to ten smaller ones? SSGI tried a few other games, but their initial 'sunk cost' investment doomed them, and they (like many other companies) were crushed by the GW Juggernaut, who provided both quantity AND quality.
Here is a transcribed copy of a page from one of the "lost" SSGI magazines, issue #5 of "Ready Room".
Here's a diorama of a pair of Wayforger-Clan Triceptors escorting one of the clan's Liberty-class Corvettes. In this game of "Check Six!", the action focuses on individual strikefighters dogfighting amoungst the stars. Our studio craftsfolk have created this Clan Corvette as a themed piece of terrain to battle over and around. This Triceptor wing consists of the wingleader and a wingman, having lost their other wingman during the fight. Their underwing stores are exhausted, so it must have been quite a fight! We encourage you to use magnets or poster-tak to be able to remove your missiles and torpedoes when launched in a battle.
The Wayforger-Clan is one of six 'uplifted' creature clans. The Wayforgers are based upon Terran dinosaur DNA, primarily 'raptor' DNA, and their "Fixed Number" is three. Aggressive and fast, they were the preeminent scout and recon units in the former Terran Hegemony.
While Capital Ships are typically too large for the tabletop, you can certainly make your own out of cereal packets, sweets containers, and tins! We show you how the studio bobbins made ours in the next article. And here are some trial rules to use when fighting in and amoungst these 'babycaps' on YOUR tabletop! Be sure and write in with your snaps and ideas, and you may be featured in the next issue of the Ready Room!
Cheers!
And remember: No Roj, just right.
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Camkierhi:
Cam created a battered outpost that has been built up around the remains of a crashed spaceship.
Cam built the original spaceship wreck around a Smarties tube, then used the metal from coke cans for all the corrugated iron, created the hatch from a sweet lid, and used chocolate wrappers to foil the satellite dish.
Commander Cain:
Cain entered with a Fallout inspired Ice Cream Kiosk by the sea.
Cain used a candy dispenser for the ice cream sign/roof, a sweet container for the kiosk, and candy wrappers for the shutters.
KernelTerror:
KernelTerror presented us with a chaos temple.
KT used a biscuit tin and it’s inner, sweet boxes and containers of liquid sugary goodness, as seen here:
Maniac_nmt:
Maniac provided a whole host of scatter terrain for 15mm sci-fi gaming - shuttles, spacecraft, billboards, missile silos and tree planters.
Here we have a variety of bubble-gum packets, gum lids, coffee stirrers - and in a beautiful irony he also used dental floss packs and packaging from a toothbrush. Plus the League’s ever favourite material sprue
Syro_ :
Syro brought a calming fountain for D&D* to the table.
Syro created the structure out of a Nerds candy packet – possibly an extra meta reference :8
*Other RPG’s are available.
Viktor von Domm:
Greasy Towers
Vik gave us a pair of silos with a sniper friendly gantry.
Vik’s towers were created from chocolate crisp packets, with a box of chocolates forming the base unit.
I’m sure you’ll agree there is a display of brilliant work from all, lots of creativity brought to the table, which is what we like to see from the League comps.
And a brief behind-the-scenes montage – unfortunately I couldn’t source the blooper reel.
I'l head over to the public vote to see where that is, and return shortly to announce the winners!
Public voting was very close, with three entries pulling marginally ahead.
BrianCJ bagged popular vote from the masses, one vote ahead of Maniac_nmt, who in turn was one vote away from Commander Cain.
Excellent work guys, and kudos to Brian.
For my own judging, you all gave me a hard choice, which is always good, as it reflects the work out in. Such a hard job, that I decided to make a slight adjustment to the planned presentation of the award
In the end it came down to two entries, and I honestly spent considerable time pondering the effects of a tie.
BrianCJ and Maniac_nmt proved to be as popular with me as with the voters, both providing coolness in abundance.
Brian's piece oozes coolness for me, in no small part because the inspiration of Blake's 7 was a big bit for me in my childhood. That coupled with the fact that it's pretty much only the detailing which wasn't based on Sweet Stuff is what pulled him ahead of the field. Plus the awesome fluff piece
Maniac managed to not only create multiple brilliant pieces - those ships feel hugely nostalgic to me in their builds - but also incorporated the anti-Sweet Stuff bits. The multiple builds showed creativity, and using the wrapper as is to make a billboard was inspired.
Outstanding work guys, seriously
In the end it was Maniac_nmt who I decided just took it - the number of pieces giving plentiful scatter terrain, plus a little addition of the wonder stuff we know as Sprue giving his entry the tiniest edge over Sweet Liberty.
Congratulations Maniac_nmt, the 27th winner of the League of Extraordinary Riveteers terrain competition!
You may proudly fly the LoER flag. PM me with your address and I'll put together a goodie-bag of bits for your delight.
Great work everyone, brilliant entries all, and some worthy terrain added to all your collections. Awesome pieces all, and great to see the development In your galleries. As always I'm happy to give detailed comments on your work if you want, as although I was taking coolness as my main focus this round, I wasn't ignoring other factors
Loving everything even more now that I have seen the extra pictures!
Brian: Love the variety of bits on the ship, particularly the wall plugs
Cam: Super build overall, the gold foil on the dish is a perfect fit.
KernelTerror: My personal favourite of the competition, I love the mix between Chaos, Stranger Things, and Game of Thrones that the design gives off, very spooky!
Maniac: Congrats! I would never have had the ambition to make that many bits of terrain all at once, everything is awesome, I imagine I will be stealing the idea for planters at some point and the billboard is a simple yet super cool use of a candy bar wrapper.
Syro: Love the water effects and the sculpted eagle, it's gonna look great alongside your other terrain
Vik: Those towers are awesome, had I not seen the wip shots I would have assumed it was a plastic kit!
I am honored, very much so. There were some fantastic pieces this time around. I will have to go back through all of the past competitions and come up with something fun for my stab at it. I do enjoy these, there is always some neat ideas to borrow.
I have to credit my kids for some of the pieces. They emptied out one of the pieces I used to make a ship, and were patient with me digging through the hardware isle to find the tape measure.
Congrats to you Maniac ! Looking forward to reading what you come up with for the next round !
Since you offer, I'd be really interested in hearing additional feedback on my piece. In particular, I tried as much as possible to integrate Cam's last round comments, about resolution and details, hence the faces, statues and jars, would love some CC on how that worked out.
Overall a great piece, will look good on the table, very atmospheric, and I'd say you've taken on board the feedback you got from Cam last round.
One stand out for me was it could probably have done with a bit more tonal variation, particularly around the upper layers. There's a great feeling of it emerging from the detritus of the grimy floor, getting lighter as it gets higher, but some subtle washes or glazes across the metal at the top would have added that extra depth to it.
Related to this was the triangular area under the 'warp portal', this was a bit flat, would have benefited from some more detailing, or some variation in the tones again, maybe giving that area a faint sheen. Nothing major required, but it's not adding anything either at the moment.
Detailing was good, the faces, the vases, the 'warp portal ' at the top. Catching those faces with yellow to complement the yellow wiring was a nice touch, for me personally I'd have liked to see that yellow wire grunged up a little bit more, but that's just me. Maybe if some of the other wiring-cum-pipework also had a touch of yellow. Some of the detailing, like the vents on top of the vase unit could have done with being picked out a bit more, maybe even just an extra wash around them.
The four alcove feel as if something more could have been done, but again, it could be as simple as darkening them up in contrast to the surrounding parts.
So basically I think all those points amount to the same basic premise of a bit more tonal variation - could perhaps have just said that
The build itself was very creative, great use of the materials and the theme. I especially liked the construction of those alcoves, and as I opened with, I feel it's a very atmospheric piece with some great touches - the bust-like parts at the corners and on the arch are really nice, big fan of the wires and pipes, and the display of vases adds a good air of mystery. Pieces like this will create a really dark atmospheric table, and that's one of the things I like to see In these competitions, a sense of Where. Along with improving our technical skills, our construction methods, our painting, I enjoy seeing the world-building, and this is a great example of that.
Great work Maniac_NMT! Congratulations! And great work everyone else too! I was impressed with all the pieces, and this must have been very hard to judge for monkeytroll. Even the popular vote was very close and spread out, most of the contests I've seen the popular vote was more of a land slide.
@monkeytroll: That recap was a very nice touch, and looks like it took a lot of time to put together.
@Commander Cain: Thanks! The fountain will definitely stand out from my other terrain, it's hard not to push ourselves to really make something special for these contests.
Thanks a lot for taking the time to write all this MonkeyTroll, much appreciated. I'll keep these points in mind for the next round, while it will probably be in the same dark colour tones, but I'll pay more attention to opportunities for colour variations and highlight patches.
Obviously this is all subjective KT, but it depends lot on the piece. Yours was a very large build this time, with some large surface areas, and at least one big flat surface, so introducing subtle tones helps break those up - to my mind - whereas a smaller piece could possibly have only needed that existing shift from dark bottom to lighter top.
And someone else may disagree entirely
Very good points MT, I love your piece yet again KT, so much character and really great aesthetic going on, your board will be some brilliant place. I love the details you have added, I just wonder if you got a bit lost in scale as happens. I think there was a missed opportunity with the dolls to inject some serious colour and the alcoves could easily have had a little osl going on. But that is nit picking a brilliant piece bud.
And @ MonkeyTroll I would love some feedback, always good for the collective.
Point taken on the flat triangular surfaces MT (wanted to emulate similar surfaces on antique temples, although on said temple, these triangles were covered in statues !).
I also agree that the alcoves could have used a darker shade. Again, such feedback is much appreciated and will be kept in mind for the next piece.
Thanks a lot Cam ! OSL in the alcoves and near the portal would have been nice indeed, and would have ticked the "try something you have never done before" LoER checkbox. And lost in scale ? yeah most probably ^^ I almost always am, is not the entire 40k universe also lost in scales ?
This may mean it's not necessarily the BEST model that wins....that's just the way I'm rolling this round 
that's bonkers! (Said the guy who built a space station of an ice cream tub). Great idea. I'll have a think.
Nice work so far everyone.
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